Sunday, January 01, 2006


2006 Web/Consumer Electronics Predictions


  1. Windows Vista will slip into 2007. There will be at least two very high profile “retirements” at Microsoft attached to this.
  2. Comcast will offer TiVo service bundled with its set top boxes. Existing TiVo customers will be disappointed with the costs and technical hurdles involved in tying together their existing accounts with Comcast’s offering.
  3. Xbox360 early adopters will complain loudly about a 6-month “game drought”, as the gap between the launch titles and the next wave of games makes them question the wisdom of an early purchase.
  4. Sony will ship the Playstation 3 on the ninth of September. There will be at least one flawless game, and about 2 dozen mediocre ones. Early sales will be quite strong, as the system will be one of the cheapest ways to get a BluRay disc player attached to your HDTV.
  5. HDTV will achieve a 25% penetration rate in N. American households around Christmas 2006, thanks to extremely aggressive pricing on LCD sets from east Asian manufacturers.
  6. Apple will finally announce it’s living-room entertainment solution. They will ship a broadband attached set top box/DVR (basically an Intel-based Mac mini on steroids) with dual HD tuners, CableCard support, an iPod dock, and 802.11n. It will, of course, be tightly coupled to the iTunes store. They will also ship several different Cinema displays which will be styled to match.
  7. Google will partner with Apple to provide web services for the new home entertainment platform.
  8. Yahoo will continue to buy startups, and will continue to fail to integrate them into their main-line business.
  9. Google will introduce Google Calendar, which will expose an AtomAPI-based facility for synchronization.
  10. There will be several dozen new OPML applications. None will interoperate in any meaningful fashion, and the developers will be forced to wear a scarlet “F” (for funky) on their shirts.

:: Dave Walker 14:08 (EST/EDT) [+] ::

:: [/misc/webmemes]
:: tags:

:: Comments (4)

Comments:

Paul Mison wrote:

Title: Banging the TV "lack of TV standards" drum again

Date: 1/1/2006 14:38:23

Response:
So, this Mac mini PVR: what sort of TV tuners? Analog ones? Ones that work with US cable? And no matter which of those they choose, won't it be NTSC only? Also, isn't releasing a product that nobody outside the US can buy more the sort of thing you associate with the likes of Dell than Apple?
d.w. wrote:

Title:

Date: 1/1/2006 14:49:08

Response:
Hi Paul... Well, assuming they're not complete idiots (er, that would be assuming a lot, eh?) the actual video hardware will be on a daughtercard that differs by region. I know standard def is a swamp of NTSC/PAL/SECAM whatever the fuh, but, if they simplify things by ignoring the existence of over-the-air broadcasting, doesn't it become manageable? I will confess to being ignorant of European HDTV (not enough hours in the day as it is -- I have to concentrate on the stuff that directly affects my living room), but I can't imagine it's insurmountable.
Paul Mison wrote:

Title:

Date: 1/5/2006 06:45:07

Response:
Well, if you limit yourself to over-the-air analog(ue) then it does get easier, yes. HDTV isn't the real problem in Europe (roll-out is only just starting); it's the fact that there's a lot of digital broadcasting, and recompression (which is implied by analogue) looks awful, but handling all the different transmission methods is tricky (see the DVB-T and DVB-S options that EyeTV have to offer). Still, we'll see.
d.w. wrote:

Title:

Date: 1/5/2006 07:14:22

Response:
Then I suppose they'll need to treat it as the nontrivial problem that it is and roll out different products in different regions, which will obviously mean they wouldn't be able to ship all the versions simultaneously. Can't be helped, I suppose -- blame the lack of commercial/governmental coordination which has resulted in a maze of incompatible video "standards"...



FORTUNE'S FUN FACTS TO KNOW AND TELL: #2 Horses are forbidden to eat fire hydrants in Marshalltown, Iowa.